The invention relates to a plastic suction cup made of a flexible transparent material which can be placed in a sealing manner on a glass pane and, in a vacuum-tight manner, can be pierced with a hollow needle for pane repair operations and the like.
According to the previous state of the art--see German patent (DE-PS) 36 07 738--minor stone throw damage to laminated safety glass is repaired by generating a slight vacuum over the spot to be repaired by means of a suction cup and then, by means of a one way syringe, piercing the outer skin of the suction cup, which is homogeneous with respect to the wall thickness, in order to introduce the repair resin. In this case, it was found over and over again that, on the one hand, it is quite difficult to pierce the outer skin with the needle because the suction cup rests on the glass too flatly when the vacuum is too high, and, on the other hand, the repair resin will continue to flow to the lower part of the plastic suction cup.
An object of the invention consists of permitting an easy insertion for the hollow needle of the one-way syringe, and to hold the introduced resin at the damaged spot in a targeted manner, i.e, largely preventing a running of the repair resin.
According to the invention, this object is achieved by a suction cup arrangement wherein a wall of the plastic suction cup has a spot which is thinner than its remaining wall thickness for accommodating the piercing by the hollow needle, and wherein a collecting pocket is provided in the interior of the plastic suction cup which can be reached by the hollow needle, which collecting pocket is open in the same direction as the suction cup itself and the front edge of which collecting pocket is set back with respect to a contact edge of the plastic suction cup and which, at its circumference, has an opening pointing to the thin spot, for the passage of the hollow needle.
It is the advantage of the invention that, when the suction device is used, it can no longer be pressed too flatly against the glass because of the distance-securing collecting pocket, and thus the hollow needle of the injection syringe, which contains the repair resin, reaches the collecting pocket in a targeted and reliable manner. This syringe also has the advantage that, on the one hand, as a result of the transparency of the used material, it can be placed on the damaged spot in a targeted manner while determining the limits. On the other hand, it is used as a storage space for the repair medium, and the resin can therefore no longer flow into the lower-positioned part at the edge of the plastic suction cup.
Other objects, advantages and novel features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description of the invention when considered in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.